To the editor: Reading Mr. Phelps recent article, “Are English Departments Really Dying”, I was surprised by the conclusions he drew from the data he referenced at the U.S. Education … Continue reading “English departments are really dying”
On August 3, the Executive Committee of the Conference on College Composition and Communication approved a position statement on “Black Linguistic Justice.” The statement was crafted as a set of … Continue reading “Disadvantaging Black Students with a Demand for ‘Linguistic Justice’”
A recent book by Thomas L. Martin and Duke Pesta, The Renaissance and the Postmodern: A Study in Comparative Critical Values represents something of a critical cat among the contemporary … Continue reading “Why Literary Scholarship Matters”
A major in English was once a serious endeavor masquerading as a frivolous one. Despite the occasional “do you want fries with that?” condescension from business or science students, the … Continue reading “Three Ways Declining English Departments Can Be Relevant Again”
So you think you might like teaching college English. You love the language and its great works. Lots of people are like that, including me. Good, but beware. Teaching college … Continue reading “Teaching Freshman English: It’s a Battlefield”
The English major has lost its way; here is a path back.
Some administrators evaluate pedagogy not on whether it works but on whether it has been done for the past fifty years.
Few undergraduates have read more than the topical “edgy” fiction sold by hucksters to middle and high schools.
The discipline of English is already in trouble, but there is more to come.